February 1, 2010

Harvard educated Dr. Andrew Weil spoke with Digg founder Kevin Rose on health issues of concern to computer geeks. What did he have to say? Cut down on the soda pop: it's high in sugar and encourages obesity and type 2 diabetes. HFCS? It's probably not much worse than "real" sugar, but it encourages low quality foods to flood the market. Energy drinks? Read the label for sugar and caffeine. You're better off sticking with inexpensive coffee and tea. Dairy? It's not horrible unless overconsumed. Soy? The epidemiological evidence says it's safe and beneficial if consumed in whole food form. Fish? Sardines and sockeye salmon are good, along with fish oil. Cell phone radiation? Keep it away from your head. Computer screen eye problems? Look into the distance every minute or two.

Dermatologists and other doctors seeking to make names for themselves often get quoted in women's fashion magazines to tout the latest procedures and raise their profiles in the media. But the Food and Drug Administration has warned one highly quoted doc -- Leslie Baumann of Miami Beach -- against talking about the wrinkle treatment Dysport, which at the time hadn't yet been approved by the FDA. The agency says her 2007 comments about the injectable drug violated rules against drug promotion and asked her to explain how she'll avoid such conflicts in the future. It has long been common practice for beauty editors and other journalists to look to researchers for info on cutting edge treatments; more scrutiny by the Obama administration may halt that practice.

We told you a few days ago about a recall of salami from Daniele based on fears that the product -- particularly the pepper used in it -- was tainted with salmonella. The company has now expanded that recall to include about 17,000 pounds of ready-to-eat Italian sausage. This recall adds the company's sopressata products to the already recalled salami. The recall has been expanded because salmonella was found in a Daniele sausage product being tested in Illinois as part of an ongoing investigation into the source of the salmonella Montevideo strain, which has been sickening people for months. Daniele products are sold at Costco and Sam's Club, as well as smaller grocery chains.

About 21 percent of all people in the UK smoke, and health ministers would like to cut that number to 10 percent in the next decade. They aim to do that with regulations like those going into effect in Scotland next year that will ban cigarette machines. They also want to eliminate branding on cigarette packets and help prevent young people from taking up the habit by cutting illegal imports of cheap cigarettes. It's possible smoking will be banned in front of buildings as well as inside them. Smoking kills an estimated 80,000 people in Britain each year and costs the NHS 2.7 billion pounds a year in health costs.

Researchers at the University of Cincinnati have been successful in using peptides to “starve” blood vessels in the fat tissue of laboratory animals, resulting in appetite suppression and significant weight loss. And the good news doesn’t stop there ... The research team, led by Randy Seeley, Ph.D of UC’s Metabolic Diseases Institute, found that fat loss occurred without major changes to energy expenditure, despite reduced food intake. Additionally, there were no signs of illness associated with the experiments. "The findings highlight the ability to provide new therapeutic strategies for obesity based on these dynamics of blood vessels in our fat tissue," said Seeley.

Children whose parents receive regular dental care are more likely to receive it themselves, according to a soon-to-be-published study in the journal Pediatrics. The study, which is available online, is the first to analyze the effect of parents’ dental hygiene habits on their children. “When parents don’t see the dentist, their children are much less likely to see the dentist,” says the study’s lead author, Inyang Isong, MD, MPH, of the MassGeneral Hospital for Children (MGHfC) Center for Child and Adolescent Health Policy. Earlier studies of the impact of parental oral hygiene on their children were narrowly focused on particular demographic groups. This new research sought to broaden parameters by studying data from a cross section of the US population.